


A Labyrinth of Hope

by Snealeth



Category: Battle For Dream Island (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Major Character Undeath, Not Beta Read, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Apocalypse, We Die Like Men
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-18
Updated: 2020-06-19
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:06:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24782806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snealeth/pseuds/Snealeth
Summary: During a post-apocalyptic world caused by the death of Four, Tennis Ball, Ruby, and their gang of survivors have to survive in a giant wooden bunker in the middle of nowhere. While waiting for... something, the group inside have to learn to get along with each other while they attempt to ascertain everybody else's location. Especially the newcomer, Pin, who's having a hard time remaining stuck in this bunker.
Relationships: Other Relationship Tags to Be Added, Pin & Everyone (Battle For Dream Island), Pin & Tennis Ball (Battle For Dream Island)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 24





	1. Wake Up.

The moon glowed brightly, illuminating the dead, grey bodies that were once green grass. Trees were burnt, ashy, and practically disintegrated. The sky an unnatural bluish-gray, clouds visibly dark. She looked up. It was going to rain soon. 

Not that I’ll be alive to see it, she thought.

Her steps were clearly audible, as there were no other sounds for miles. She was the only living thing for miles, having gotten from her group days ago. Now, she’s been migrating, silently begging for something. Some mercy that will keep her alive. Nothing. She prays, one more time, in a last, desperate plea to whatever divine mercy that could save her now. She looks back at the ground, in her heart knowing her actual fate.

Of course this is how I’ll die, she thought. Not for any self-sacrifice or something worth any glory. I’ll die from starvation. Alone. No one around but me. 

She’d cry if she has any tears in her body. 

She feels as if the universe is degrading around her. It’s difficult for her to think right now. She gulps with a dry throat. 

Haha. This wouldn’t nearly be as scary if Four was alive. If she was just in his silly little game, with her team. Alas, those days are gone now. 

She misses her team. She misses everybody. 

She only just now realized she’s on the floor. She can’t move her arms. 

She can’t move.

Her breathing is getting shallower by the minute, she only barely notices.

She accepts her fate. There is no help. This is her last living hours.

She thinks she feels a raindrop hit her. Guess she was wrong earlier.

She closes her eyes.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Tennis Ball sat on a wooden stool, a blank expression on his face. Repetitively, he’s continuously pressing letters, typing in names. Repetitively, he cranks the lever on the Recovery Center. And, repetitively, he continues to see the same loud sound effect and red text. N-E-E-D-L-E, he types in the letterpad. “ERROR!!!!” The center’s screen shows. “CAN’T RECOVER NEEDLE. NEEDLE STILL ALIVE.”

Tennis Ball groans. He cannot count how many times he’s seen that text. It’s practically ingrained in his brain. He doesn’t like doing this. Sitting aimlessly and typing names of his former friends to see if any of them has died. It’s boring, almost never pays off, and gives him thoughts too dark to be comfortable. N-I-C-K-E-L. Red text. Can’t recover him.

Yet again, it’s good to remind yourself of the ones you miss sometimes. Living in a giant wooden bunker with eight other people, practically being trapped in the building and begging fate for life to get better. It’s easy to lose hope. However, if you think about the friends you’re trying to find, the possible light at the end of the tunnel, you’ll be able to keep up hope and survive. P-E-N. Red text. Can’t recover.

Well, he’d argue, the invisible voice in his head is right. But that’s if you think about it sometimes. If you think about the lost 56 contestants constantly, like everyone in this building trapped by a post-apocalypse at all times do, then it will only further destroy your hopes. And, he’d continue, it gets worse when you’re almost always the one to recover everybody. Like him. P-E-N-C-I-L. Red text.

Yeah, ever since he crafted the recovery center, he’s normally the one to have to sit here and recover everyone. It’s been around... three months since he built it? The group has gotten from 3 to 9, so that’s definitely a bonus, but that’s three months, and he’s only gotten 6 contestants. Out of 61. He’s starting to think that there’s somebody else with a recovery center. At least it’s an upgrade to two months with only him, Ruby, and X. He swears he was about to go crazy during then, before he had enough material to make a recovery center. P-I-E. Red text.

He’s not sure how he ended up with those two in particular. With the chaos that was the death of Four and… whatever happened afterwards, everybody was scattered. He’s learned from 8-Ball that most headed north, to the shredded remains of Yoyle City. Several had given the idea to move forth, but he still doesn’t think it’s a good idea. He didn’t think then, either. It’s just… too risky of an endeavor, considering that the people to migrate out to it could end up forever lost. P-I-L-L-O-W. Red.

If he has anybody that he wants to know where they are, they want Golf Ball. He misses her. He hasn’t been able to figure out where in Place where Tennis Balls are Created GB’s located. He misses her. P-I-N.

Ding!

...His breath stops.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Pin flops on the ground immediately, and in rapid succession her now restored body has a flood of thoughts.

One: S-she died. She was dead, how is she still alive?! She was quite definitely dead, she remembers it vividly, she was lying on the floor starving. But, yeah she’s alive right now. She pinches her arm, and winces in pain. Why- how is she alive?! 

Two: Where is she?! She looks up, and, yeah that’s definitely artificial lighting on the ceiling. She didn’t think that the world had enough material right now to even MAKE artificial lights. The walls are a vibrant orange, which make her eyes very uncomfortable considering she’s been walking in a world of greys and blacks for weeks. 

Three: She’s crying. She’s alive, she’s actually alive! She’s utterly euphoric. 

Four: She’s not alone.

She looks next to her.

Tennis Ball.

Despite not knowing Tennis Ball that well, she knew that he’s smart. He’d know. She stared at him, with pleading eyes. With a look from Tennis Ball, she uttered with the most painful hope that Tennis Ball has ever heard:

“...It… was a dream? F-Four’s alive? The world’s not destroyed, broken into pieces, it’s alive, it’s been alive, right? R-right?”

Tennis Ball’s expression, seeming to have expected a question of this sort, stood silently for what felt like hours. Eventually, he shook his head.

“No.”

Now Pin’s breath stopped. “W-what? No, it had to be fake!”

“No-”

“No, no, please! Tell me, it was fake! It wasn’t real, everyone’s alive! You’re alive! Needle, Leafy, Cake, Eggy, Bubble, Nickel! They’re all alive!”

“They’re all alive.”

That was the wrong response, as Pin grew more delirious. “Then it never happened! Simple as that-”

“They’re all alive.” Tennis Ball repeated, but continued on. “But they’re all missing. Four’s dead. The world is still apocalyptic.”

“Missing?! N-no! It’s a dream! T-they’re alive, so it’s a dream! It’s a dream! Please, tell me! It never happened!”

Tennis Ball breathed out a sigh of pity, and shook his head. “It’s not a dream.”

“N-no!” Pin fell on her knees. “Please, I’m begging you, it’s a dream! It’s a dream! It’s…” Pin’s words grew too wracked with sobs to continue. The tears fall cleanly and efficiently.

Tennis Ball walks over to her. She’s still sobbing. Unconsciously, her arms wrapped around the green sphere, as she obsessively whispered. “It was a dream!” 

She was given no response.

Her sobs had no prayer.

Time did not exist for Pin. She was too busy crying. Begging for mercy to come to her, that she wouldn’t have to continue in a world of terror.

Mercy did not come to her. There was no response to her tears.

Despite this, she continued to cry.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


”I’m sorry.” It’s the first thing out of Pin’s mouth after she calmed down. The two were sitting in front of the wall. The door that leads to the hallway was locked, for privacy’s sake. Tennis Ball never continued trying to recover everybody.

”Don’t worry.” Tennis Ball responded. “You’re not the only one to snap once you were recovered.” He thought about what happened when Marker & Bracelety were recovered.

Pin was about to just leave it at that, but a specific part of that peaked her interest. “The only one?” She realized she didn’t know who was here and who wasn’t

”Oh, yeah. There’s…” He stopped for a moment to think about it. “In order of coming into this group, there’s me, X, Ruby, Match, Marker, Grassy, Bracelety, 8-Ball, and Spongy. And you, just now.”

“Yeah.” She says, masking her disappointment. None of those people she really knew very well. She was hoping for Needle, or Eggy, or Nickel. Guess she’ll just have to live with people she barely knows.

”Wait, X is alive?” She asks, questioningly.

Tennis Ball’s response is as if he expected it. “Yeah. Didn’t expect them to be?”

“Yeah, since Four died, why wouldn’t X die?”

”Well,” He starts to explain, “I.... okay, that’s a good question. I’m not sure myself.” 

”Do you think that if X died, the apocalypse would worsen?”

The silence was tense. Finally, he said tersely, ”I don’t want to find out.”

She nods. She doesn’t want to find out either.

She gets up, and thinks about her mental breakdown earlier. She asks yet another question. ”You said they’re all alive, but they’re missing? What’s up with that?”

”The recovery center says that they’re all alive.” Pin nods at that. It makes sense. “I presume they’re scattered throughout Goiky in different groups. 8-Ball said many of them were going to Yoyle City.”

”How does he know that?”

He stays quiet a moment, and then laughs nervously. He rubs his head. ”...I never asked him, actually. I should later.” Pin snorts at that, but then yawns. ”You tired?”

”Yeah. Crying for seemingly hours takes a lot out of you.” She says, chuckling without humor. Tennis Ball follows suit.

”Well, then I won’t stress you out with revealing everybody to you now then. I’ll bring you to your room, and you can sleep. There’s a phone line in everybody’s room, you can call me when you wake up and I can call a meeting.”

”Thanks.” Pin doesn’t want to think about what’ll happen when she meets the rest of the gang. Especially Match and Spongy.

Tennis Ball walked up to the door, and unlocked it, but stopped. ”...Wait, how am I supposed to hide you from then while you go to your room?”

Pin didn’t think of that. ”I don’t know. Do you have any ideas?” She says, hopefully, though not expecting him to.

Surprisingly, ”I do, but…” He looked away. “Will you promise me not to tell anybody about this?”

”Uh, sure?”

”Thanks.”

Tennis Ball signaled Pin to follow him, and they both walked to one of the corners in the room. He stomps on the floor, and to Pin’s surprise, the floor they were standing on elevated down to some dark underground hallway. 

“...What is this place?” Pin questions immediately.

”Oh, it’s just my web of underground tunnels!” He boasts proudly, clearly excited to be talking about a construction of his.

It’s so… dark, she thinks. Feels more like some place that somebody would want to keep hidden and has some dark secret. ”Does anybody else know about this place?”

“Uh, no. You’re the first one I told.”

Tennis Ball is a bad liar.

After a disbelieving stare, he sighs and relents. ”Okay, fine. Ruby knows.”

That was not something that Pin was expecting. ”Ruby? Did she find them by accident?”

“No, I deliberately showed her them.” He says, soundly genuinely curious at why she’d ask.

”What?”

Pin’s abrasive tone immediately set Tennis Ball in defense mode. ”She’s my friend, and arguably the co-captain of this whole group. She’s a surprisingly good leader when she wants to be.”

”Huh.” Pin definitely doesn’t really believe that Ruby would be a good leader, but she’s too tired to question it.

”Well, we’re here.” Tennis Ball says suddenly. Pin looks around, and, yeah this place is definitely not those dark rocky tunnels from earlier. Honestly, she thinks, this hallway looks surprisingly cozy. The walls are well painted, and it just seems like a good place to be in.

Pin realizes she hasn’t said anything in a few seconds, and suddenly feels sheepish. ”Thanks.”

”No problem.” He says, turning around. “I’ll see you next time you wake up.”

”Goodnight.” Pin waves as Tennis Ball walks away. She stood around awkwardly for a few minutes, until she heard footsteps and immediately opened and shut the door. She sighs, as she looks around. 

The room is rather basic, with minimal wall decorations and only a bed and a table. The bedsheets are a bright yellow, and it immediately reminds her of The Losers. Suddenly, she misses them again.

She doesn’t know what to think about this. She’s alive, she’s actually alive. She’s been given a second chance! But… she’s stuck with almost a dozen people she barely knows or dislikes, she’s now without her best friend, and she’s stuck in this apocalyptic wasteland only now she’s in some sort of weird building she never asked about. She really should’ve.

She stares at the floor. Well, at least it’s not the middle of nowhere, right? There’s presumably actual food here, and people to talk to. It’s better than then.

BFB was better than now, though. She misses BFB. Even if it only lasted three episodes, it was still fun. Then Four blew up, and basically destroyed the planet.

She misses BFB.

The last thought she has before slumber consumes her is, “So does everyone else.”


	2. First Day on the Job

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pin re-introduces herself to everybody, and formally meets several others for the first time. Also, her door is barged into.

When Pin jumped awake, two things popped in her head. One, where in the holy pin factory is she? That thought abruptly fades when her memory comes back. She flinches at the thought of her death. Two, the intruder in her room. The long literally-a-stick person closed the door sneakily, looked at Pin, and her expression seemed to simultaneously beam and fall.

Eventually, when Match speaks, she’s decided on disappointment. “Oh, it’s you.” 

“Yes it’s me, why are you in my room?” 

Match rolled her eyes as if the question wasn’t a really good one. “Well, like, excuse me for wanting to see what TB and Rubes were, like, trying to hide! They always, like, act like this whenever a new person arrives, so it was probably obvious that someone had arrived. Of course, I wanted to, like, figure out who that person is.” Match folds her arms. “And it’s you.”

Pin only barely managed to conceal a done-with groan. If there was a person she didn’t want to meet again, it was Match. While she hasn’t interacted with her since BFDIA, they never really solved their dislike for one another. And now, at least she’ll guess it, it’s back in full force. Pin doesn’t like Match’s judgmental personality or how they always shove ‘like’ into every second, and Match still holds a grudge to Pin’s old bossy behavior. And now Match is back in full force, and she’ll have to deal with Match for however long it takes.

Oh no.

Pin shakes her head, redirecting her focus to the conversation. “Well, yeah, it’s me. Who did you expect?”

“I don’t know. Pencil?” Match says.

“Whatever.”

The conversation stalled, and the atmosphere turned tense. 

Eventually, Pin stated, ”Why are you still here?”

“I wanted to get you to, like, promise that you wouldn’t cause chaos in here,” Match explains, with an unreadable expression on her face. Pin thinks it’s concern, but not for the person Match is talking to. “I’ve never seen you positively interact with anybody in here, and I don’t want to, like, clean up your messes.”

”What’s that supposed to mean?” Pin said with a glare.

”Nothing!” Immediately, Match came to her own defense exasperatedly. “Just, I’m suspicious of you.”

Uh-huh. Like that was a good defense. All Pin could say in response to that is the words, ”Leave.” They had absolutely no room for argument. While Match clearly wanted to say something else, she decided against it. She left with a bored wave and a slam of the door. Pin groaned. Match was as much of an antagonistic jerk as she remembered. 

Pin looked around, and noticed something she did not when she woke up- there was… food on the table? She got up and walked towards it. Yeah, it was your generic school lunch tray, with a note on the table. Pin picked it up and read it.

“Hey! TBTB told me that you hadn’t eaten when you were recovered, so here’s some food before you go bug the big boy! <3, Ruby!” 

It looks so Ruby. She still doesn’t get how Ruby could be a leader in any sense of the word.

Pin looked at the actual food, and it looks… edible. At the very best. Doesn’t look very appetizing. She grabbed the spoon hanging out from the pile of mush and took a bite. It’s better than she expected. She just hopes there’s variety. 

The only other thing on the table was the telephone- presumably, the one Tennis Ball told her- and a box. She was about to think that Tennis Ball never gave her a phone number until she realized that the buttons had some contestant’s names on it. TB, Ruby, X, and some contestants that she’s close to.

It takes far too much effort to rip her eyes away from the button that’s labeled ‘Coiny’.

She put her attention to the small purple box and took off the lid. It takes her a few seconds to realize the similarities to the buttons on the telephone. When she realizes that, she’s very confused. She hypothesizes that they’re there if she needs to call someone that’s not on the phone, but she’s not a good engineer. She doesn’t think taking one of these buttons off the phone and placing another one would work.

Eh, she can check that later. She goes back to the phone. There are nine buttons, and an empty slot below them. She reads them left to right, up to down. The labels are Tennis Ball, Ruby, X, Bubble, Cake, Golf Ball, Loser, Coiny, and Needle. There’s an empty hole below Coiny. She digs through the box and places Fanny’s button into the empty spot. She’ll figure out how to make it work later.

After staring at the keyboard for an inappropriate amount of time, she presses the button labeled as Tennis Ball. 

“Hey, Tennis Ball,” She says, twirling the wire that connects the keypad to the phone around her finger. “I’m ready.”

“Why are we doing this again?” Pin asked as she, Tennis Ball, and Ruby rode the elevator to somewhere with poor lighting and some red wall. It takes her a few seconds to compute that this is probably a stage, and that’s the curtain.

“Define ‘this’.” Tennis Ball.

“Why are you making…” She gestures wildly to herself and eventually spat out, “me, this big event?”

Tennis Ball was about to answer, but Ruby, with as cheery a voice as ever, answered first. “To remind everybody why we’re staying here.”

Pin gave her a flat look. ”Which is?”

”You’re trying to steal Eraser’s job while he’s gone, huh?”

”No-”

”Just messing with you.” She elongated the ‘you’ as she waved her anxieties away. “Anyway, that reason is to reunite with everybody. All sixty-four of them. If we show that you’re here now, it’ll give them hope that our plan is succeeding!” She pumped her fists in the air excitedly. Her enthusiasm is surprisingly infectious.

”Yup.” Tennis Ball decided to butt in. “And also, if we introduce everybody to you it makes it easier to integrate you into the system.”

”You sound like you’re trying to brainwash me.”

He gave a nervous laugh. “Sorry.” He then turns to the gemstone. ”Ruby, I’m going to turn on the intercom, you like, talk to Pin or something.”

”Okay dokay!” 

As Tennis Ball left, Pin just had to ask. “You guys have an Intercom?”

”Yeah! For announcements such as these! And also to warn when some sort of natural disaster is happening.”

Pin fidgets nervously. “Right.” She knows what Ruby is referring to deeply. That’s how her group lost Rocky and Clock. She was about to specify she meant how did they get an intercom, but her mood has been ruined somewhat.

She hears part of Tennis Ball’s announcement. Something about… getting to the auditorium at the earliest convenience.

Seeming to realize Pin’s mood, Ruby swapped conversation topic. ”Anyway, so!” She claps her hands. “What do you think of this place so far?”

With a humorous tone surprising even herself, “Can’t really think much at all about it, considering I’ve been hidden from everybody.” Ruby nods with a smile. “It looks nice so far, though.”

“That’s good! Did you know X is the one that built most of it? Apparently, he made many buildings for what would have happened in BFB. And, when we got Match, she gave a lot of tips for the actual appearance of the building! Before then, it kind of looked boring.”

“Huh. Never took X for an architect.”

Ruby shrugged. ”Me neither!” She looked at Tennis Ball. “Hey, big boy!”

He spun around, seemingly angry. She can’t tell if he’s faking it or not. ”I told you to stop calling me that!”

Another wave. She seems to like doing that. ”Shush. Anyway, who’s outside?”

He gives an open mouth for a second, forgetting to do that. He went to the curtains and poked his head through it. A few seconds later, he looked back at Ruby. ”Uh, there’s Match, X, Bracelety, 8-Ball, Grassy, and,” Another peak, “Spongy. Marker’s nowhere to be found.”

”Again?” Ruby said as she groaned.

Pin didn’t hear Tennis Ball’s response, as she snuck past the two. Very carefully, she poked one eye through the curtain and saw everyone. Other than Marker. And Bracelety. Where’s Bracelety?

”What do you mean where’s Bracelety?” Ruby questioned, and the sound made Pin jump and immediately close the curtain.

“Did I say that out loud?”

Tennis Ball sighs. “Yes, you did.” 

“I’m gonna go figure out where those two are.” 

Both nod, while Ruby flicks the curtain open and disappears. 

“Hey, guys!” Pin hears Ruby call. “Where’s ol’ Marker and Bracelety?”

Pin can’t hear the others, so she takes her ear off of the curtain, and looks at Tennis Ball. She sees him kicking the floor, clearly wanting to say something. She waits to see if he’ll say anything, but he says nothing. 

“Yes?”

Tennis Ball would deny he jumped at that. “Nothing! Well, there is something I’m really curious about, but I want to wait until you go up. People are going to ask you questions, after all.”

“Really?” Pin never knew that.

“Uh, yeah. None of us know your previous whereabouts.”

Pin grits her teeth. She doesn’t like the sound of that. Before she could argue against it, however, Ruby reappears. “Bracelety's back! She went to get Marker, who’s also here.”

Pin asks, still not wanting to do this. “Oh, so we can do it now?” Her tone expresses her current mindset, that she probably can’t stop this.

“I guess.” Tennis Ball says, going outside.

Ruby pushed Pin until she noticed the thumbtack was resisting and decided to offer some words of encouragement. “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure you’ll do fine!” 

She was not fine.

She was correct! Not fine. Not fine at all.

When Tennis Ball introduced her to everybody, Pin made sure to read everybody’s expressions. X waved politely, with a calm expression on his face. Pin thinks she caught a sliver of disappointment on 8-Ball but isn’t particularly sure. If she did, 8-Ball immediately caught it and turned it into blank. 

Bracelety, however, did not hide her disappointment. At all. “No! Why not Ice Cube?!”

Marker, who didn’t seem to care all that much about the newcomer, patted Bracelety on the shoulder in comfort. Grassy, who was standing next to X, wasn’t paying that much attention. Spongy audibly groaned. 

Pin risked to check Match, and yeah she can tell the dislike she has for Pin. 

It kind of hurt that X was the only one that treated her with any sense of respect. Also TB and Ruby.

Then it was the Q&A, and it got marginally better. 

Immediately, Tennis Ball asked where Pin had been all this time. Guess it's standard procedure. And Pin immediately started her story, not stopping until approximately an hour and a half later. That was mostly because of all the questions Tennis Ball and Bracelety had when it came to Golf Ball & Fanny respectively. She didn’t know Bracelety was friends with Fanny. She learns something new every day.

While talking, it was hard not to think about them. Coiny, Golf Ball, Fanny, Rocky. 

“Don’t worry, Pin! You’re talking to your right-hand man here! I know times may be tough, but we’ll be here, together!”

“Good job, red tack creature. I’d applaud your abilities if I had hands.”

“...Thanks. But I, uh, still hate you.”

“Hey, Rocky, are you okay?”

She misses them.

“...Are you okay?” She looked up at Grassy, and it only just computes to her the tears in her eyes. 

“Oh, uh, yeah-”

Tennis Ball interrupts her “Okay, I think that’s enough out of you. Thank you, Pin.”

“No, there’s no need-”

“We’ve had enough information. We don’t need you to continue.”

“Are you sure?”

Tennis Ball gave her a flat look. Pin sighs. “Okay, fine. I’ll leave.” Pin gets up and walks to the door. She looked back, giving a nervous, “Your welcome.” But before she said that, 8-Ball rolled to her. 

“You don’t know where your room is from here, don’t you? I can show you it.”

Pin was about to say that it’s not necessary, but she realizes it’s worthless. “Okay, fine.”

The two walk out of the room. The walk was rather quiet, so halfway through Pin attempted to create small-talk. “Hello. How are you?”

8-Ball’s response was blunt. “Not good.”

“Well, do you want to say why?”

“Not necessarily.”

It went silent again. 

Pin tried again. “...Does it have anything to do with that it was me and not somebody else?”

8-Ball’s response was immediate. “No. Don’t act so egotistical.”

“Well, sorry, but seeing that flash of disappointment on your face when you first saw me made me think otherwise.”

8-Ball froze on the spot and glared at Pin. “You saw nothing.”

“I know what I saw.”

“You do not.”

The silence returned, but with a far tenser inflection in it. Pin expected it to last the entire walk, but mercifully, it did not. 8-Ball eventually responded. “I wanted it to be Basketball.”

“Eh, understandable. Nobody here really knows me. I would just prefer you to say that instead of hiding it.”

“Also understandable. I apologize.” Pins nods at that. “Anyway, we are here. Everybody is going to enter the cafeteria in about an hour, so I suggest not sleeping so you can walk there when the time comes. If you want, someone can fetch you when the time comes.”

“Sure.”

“Understood. Have a good rest of your afternoon.”

“You too.” Pin says as she closes the door. She looks at her room and flops on the bed. She has no idea what she’s going to do for the next hour. She wipes her tears and decides on just meandering around the room.

It’s five minutes before she stares at the phone, and takes out the Fanny button with a little latch. Why not try to figure out how to make this work?

She’s pretty sure she’s destroyed it by the time she hears knocking. “Coming!” She shouts at the door, and then she shoves whatever is leftover from the button into the box and slams it shut. Pin opens the door and ends up surprised when it’s Marker. “Oh, hey.”

“Hey, Pin!” He drawls excitedly, which is a combination of words she never thought she’d mentally think. “8-Ball said you wanted somebody to show you the way, so I’m here!” 

“Okay then. Show the way.”

“Okay!”

After only a minute of walking with him, she’s caught off guard by the difference between Marker & 9-Ball. 9-Ball was blunt, not very talkative, and rather cold. Marker is very talkative and isn’t afraid to show emotions. He’s rambling about some cool pattern he saw on the ground earlier that day, and while Pin is only half-listening, she can’t help but enjoy it. 

“But anyway, enough about me!” He spoke suddenly. “How about you!”

“What about me?”

“Oh. Right. I didn’t think that one through.” Marker sulked, and Pin couldn’t help but chuckle. “What? Is my misery amusing to you?”

“No, no, I promise!” Pin said, still laughing.

Marker mock glared, his clumsy smile betraying his seriousness.

“Anyway, we’re here!” Pin stared. She didn’t expect it to be that close. “Didn’t expect it to be that close?” Marker asked, which gave him a weird look. He ignored it.

“Wanna sit with me and 8-Ball?”

“Uh, not really, I don’t think 8-Ball likes me that much.”

Marker didn’t believe that. “Nah, he’s just grumpy. Promise!” Pin still looked uncertain. “Okay, idea! You can sit with us for today, and if you don’t like it, you can sit somewhere else!”

“Sure, okay. That works.” 

“Yay! We gotta get our food first, though.” He says, dragging Pin’s arm to Tennis Ball and some weird invention. 

“Hey Marker! Hey Pin!” Tennis Ball said.

“Hey TB!”

“Hi.” Pin said, focusing her eyes on the machine next to the ball.

Tennis Ball noticed, and his face lit up. “Oh, this? This is my new machine! It creates food out of absolutely nothing! It doesn’t taste that good, but it means we don’t have to be hunting for food!”

“That’s… pretty ingenious.” Pin said, surprised at what the spheroid can do. Marker looked at her like she just unleashed a beast, and when Pin looked back at Tennis Ball she understood.

“Really? Wanna hear more about it?”

“Uh, sure.” Pin said, not sure what she was going to get into.

Immediately, Tennis Ball went on a rant with very scientific words that Pin barely understood. Meanwhile, Marker, amused at Pin’s frightful expression, simply grabbed a tray, pressed the button on the machine, and gave it to 8-Ball back at the table. He then went back to get himself a tray.

Tennis Ball is still rambling. Pin snaps her fingers, Tennis Ball snaps back to reality and realizes what he’s just done. He chuckles awkwardly. “Oh, I’m sorry, did I lose you?”

“No, it was interesting.”

Tennis Ball didn’t believe her. Desperate to change the subject, she grabbed a tray. “So, how do I, like, add the buttons to the phone?”

“Oh, you just place it in and it’ll work.”

Pin froze. “...What?”

“...What did you do?”

Suddenly, very embarrassed, she starts chuckling. “Well, heh, I may have accidentally destroyed the Fanny button while trying to have it work?”

Silence. Then Tennis Ball starts cackling. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, just, what?! Did you even try it before you started breaking it?”

“No!” Pin’s denial was only barely recognizable with her noises of misery.

Tennis Ball continued to cackle, while Pin just made a squeak of despair and everyone stared at the exchange humorously. 

“Hey, Pin!”

Pin was about to exit the cafeteria when she stopped. She looked behind her and saw Marker run towards her. 8-Ball’s following quite a distance back. “We have quite a bit of time left, wanna go have a tour of this building?”

“You sure?”

8-Ball is the one to answer Pin’s question. “Believe me. Whenever Marker thinks of something, he’s definitely sure of it.”

Marker nods at that. Pin rubs her head and decides the ceiling is worth looking at. “I don’t know, I don’t want to like, bother you two.”

“Pin. Marker is the one to offer it to you, not the other way around. If it would’ve bothered him, he wouldn’t have offered it at all.”

Pin twiddles with her thumbs, and finally comes to a decision. “Fine, okay. You can show me around.”

“Yay!” Marker beams at that and grabs Pin’s arm. She’s dragged out of the cafeteria.

That’s how I got roped into an hour-long tour of the place, she thinks as she shuts the door to her room. 

She’d have to say, Marker’s a surprisingly good tour guide. He’s clear, concise, but also clearly excited and his enthusiasm is very infectious. Seemed like 8-Ball agrees, as he... made a joke. She was sort of thinking that he couldn’t.

Pin walked to the table. Tennis Ball gave her a new tablet on the fly once the two calmed. One tossing piles of wires in a trash can later, the phone is now good as new.

She stared at the phone and wiped tears from her eyes.

She needs to stop looking at that thing.

Pin flops on to the bed. 

Her sleep is restless.

**Author's Note:**

> Greetings, everyone! Thank you for reading my first published fic! This is mostly a prologue, so it's rather short. For people who may not realize it, the fic is based off of the non-canon short, 'The JingJing Squisher'. I was interested in the idea of a post-apocalyptic fic with those three, and eventually changed it to everyone Cary is currently voicing, other then Rocky. He will have his time to shine, promise.
> 
> Thanks for listening in,
> 
> \- Sneal, or CoolKuy


End file.
